Boys Basketball: Vikings conquer Warriors, claim PAC-10 title

By JON VANDER LUGT, For The Times Herald

Tuesday, February 12, 2013

LIMERICK — “They probably thought I was nuts,” PAC-10 champ Perkiomen Valley coach Mike Poysden said. “I pulled out the ladder on the first day of practice and said, ‘Picture what it’s going to take. Picture what it’s going to feel like.’”

Perk Valley now knows what it feels like.

After heading out of the first quarter down to reigning champ Methacton, Perk Valley chipped away in each subsequent frame and won tonight’s PAC-10 Championship game 44-41.

Tonight’s was the third game between these teams this season. The first wasn’t close, as Methacton won handily 64-48. In the second, Perk Valley squandered an 11-point halftime lead and lost 41-39.

“As I watched that second half, we lulled them back into the game,” Poysden said about their second game against the Warriors. “We were really disappointed in that loss. It never left the back of our mind. We always said, ‘We want Methacton again.’ They worked to deserve that shot.”

They got their third shot, and this one had a distinctly different vibe than the first two match-ups. Both teams were trading leads for the duration of the game, and Methacton left the first quarter up 11-9.

The second quarter was nearly a flip-flop of the first. The Vikes scored 11 to the Warriors’ 10 and went into the half down 21-20.

“I attribute (Perk Valley’s success) to the way they’ve been playing defense,” Methacton coach Jeff Derstine said after the game. “Our first game against them, in December, Brendan (Casper) had 30 points. We worked hard to try to get it to them, but they played solid team defense.”

“They took us out of a lot of things we were trying to run,” he later said.

Casper led Methacton with 11 points, barely more than half of his season average of 21.1. The Warriors’ next best scorer, Zach Jenkins, finished with 10 and was held to only two throughout the second half.

“I told the guys, ‘Obviously, this is really disappointing. One of our goals is to win the PAC-10 championship,” Derstine said about the message to his team after tonight’s loss. “What I see is that the season’s not over. We’re gonna have to process this and regroup and come out ready to go.”

Offensively, Perk Valley remained steady in the second half, scoring 11 and 13 points in the third and fourth. Purnell Wilson led the Vikings with 16, and Rasaan Stewart scored 13.

“The kid plays fearlessly,” Poysden said about Wilson. “It doesn’t matter what happened on the last possession. To have a leader like that is a wonderful thing to have.”

Wilson drew five fouls for Perk Valley, hitting six of his nine free throws for the game, and four of five in the decisive fourth.

While his five points don’t stand out on the scorecard, Perk Valley senior Brett Davis made arguably the most important basket for the Vikes. His free-throw with 3.6 seconds left on the clock put Perk Valley up by three and sealed the game.

Davis talked about his mindset as he was standing at the free throw line late.

“If I make this, I think we got a chance,” he said. “I said to myself, ‘If I make this, our defense isn’t going to give them a chance.”

Perk Valley stole the following Methacton inbound pass, putting a cap on their win.

“Those guys are such competitors,” Poysden said about Davis and Stewart’s defensive play. “When you give them an assignment, and begin to talk about to talk about the scouting report of the player they’re going to guard, they take complete ownership.”

Stewart talked about how it felt to cut down the net after the game, and how tonight’s win is important to more than just him and his teammates.

“It’s a good feeling. It’s really good,” he said, with a smile on his face. “It’s a good thing for our school and our community.”

To put a cap on the night, Poysden talked about how he kept his team steady throughout their early-season struggles and late-season successes.

“Any time we started slipping, I tried to remind them, ‘Don’t lose sight of the end game. Don’t lose sight of what we can become.’ They did a terrific job.”